Dune: Part Two
Dune: Part Two
Paul Atreides aligns with Chani and the Fremen, fueled by a desire for retribution against those who dismantled his family. Confronted with a pivotal decision between his profound affection for an individual and the destiny of the universe, he commits to averting a dire future he alone envisions.
rg9400 reviewedNovember 1, 2024
Dune 2 was a spectacle on numerous fronts, and one of the only movies that I can truly say demands to be seen on the biggest screen possible. The cinematography is stellar, with multiple scenes composed with such attention to detail, not only in the foreground but also in the complexity of the background. Hans Zimmer is at the top of his game, and there isn't really anything I can say beyond that in terms of praise. Where I think this movie really shines though is the sound design. The thudding of the thumpers calling forward the worms, the roar of large crowds, the Voice permeating throughout a room...all of them shook me to the bone in IMAX, giving me the same visceral reaction as the characters. When people talk about Dune 2 and its cinematic quality, it is the combination of these various factors that create a stunning audiovisual feast. The proficient filmmaking coupled with the scale and epicness of the Dune story are enticing me to go to my nearest theater just to catch one of the many scenes living rent-free in my head right now.
How does the movie hold up beyond the audiovisual aspect? I am a bit reticent to label any of the acting as truly stellar, and though I enjoyed Austin Butler's Feyd-Rautha, I don't think it deserved the level of hype it had going into the movie. Timothee Chalmet is pretty good, but again, I will be surprised to see him in the Leading Actor nomination list for the Oscars next year. Despite the lack of a standout performance, the acting ensemble overall is all good across the board, without anyone necessarily feeling like a weak link. They work together really well, and no one person dominates the screen. Rebecca Ferguson was my personal favorite.
I think the one area this movie (and the one before it) suffer the most is the story/characters. Denis Villeneuve is on record saying that he feels the focus of movies should be on the image, not dialogue. And honestly, I feel it shows in his movies, especially these two Dune movies. There is a coldness and distance in this movie that makes some of the story and character interactions feel rushed, with it seeming like Denis wants to just jump to the next big setpiece. That's not to say there isn't dialogue or that the movie is pure spectacle and action -- there are quieter moments as well, as we finally start to get a bit more Bene Gesserit scheming. But you can tell that this is not his primary focus. Villeneuve seems to have changed a lot from the source material to drive home the theme and arc of Paul Atredies, and in that regard, I think he's still very cognizant of what he is trying to tell overall. There is no doubt what the thematic takeaways are from this movie, and even though there can be complexity regarding the different terminology behind all the religions and mysticism, the storytelling is still very clear. In this sense, the movie is reflective of a larger trend I see in sci-fi sometimes, to focus more on concepts and ideas than on the individuals whose roles serve more to drive those themes home than to be deep characters with their own interiority.
Given all of this, your mileage may vary a bit. If you are someone who struggles with some of the more sterile sci-fi stories and prefers character-driven material, I do think there are certain aspects of this movie that will not land. However, if you are looking for a cinematic experience, a reason to go the theater, to be a part of a movie that will undoubtedly inspire and influence future filmmaking and that will set a new bar for how large scale epics can be depicted, then go watch this right now.